Douluo Continent: Long Live the Spirit Hall

Bibi Dong's expression was quite gentle. After listening to his words, a red light flashed in her hand, and an exquisite box appeared in her hand. "I have also learned about this matter. You almost encountered danger when you were hunting the Mirror Beast."

Hunting spirit beasts to advance in rank is an unavoidable process for every spirit master. It's not feasible to always have someone protect you, so it's best to improve your own strength.

The two soul bones you absorbed before were not bad, but they were both a bit too young, so their effect on improving your aptitude probably won't be that significant.

The Spirit Hall has considerable resources; as the Holy Son, you are qualified to absorb the soul bones left behind by previous powerful figures. This particular soul bone comes from a 30,000-year-old Crimson Flame Beast; it is yours.

As Bibi Dong spoke, she opened the exquisite box, and a soul bone appeared in front of Yan. The soul bone was not large, shaped like a human arm, and was a right arm bone, which was flashing with a fiery red light.

"The right arm bone of a 30,000-year-old Crimson Flame Beast, is it only 30,000 years old?"

Yan glanced at the soul bone on the table, considered for a moment, and then shook his head. "For now, let's not use it. Although this soul bone is quite old, it didn't come from the soul beast from which I absorbed the soul ring. Perhaps I'll encounter a more suitable one when I hunt soul beasts in the future."

If you are truly interested, could you replace this soul bone with one that is suitable for Xie Yue? He gave me the Dark Gold Terrorclaw Bear soul bone before, and I said I would give him one in return.

If I remember correctly, the Spirit Hall's treasury should contain a left leg bone of the Swift Wind Chaser, produced by a 30,000-year-old Wind Demon Tiger. That soul bone would be quite suitable for him.

"The soul bone that Xie Yue gave you was only a hundred-year soul bone, right? Although the Dark Gold Terrorclaw Bear's soul bone is of extremely high quality, it certainly can't compare to a ten-thousand-year soul bone. You're so accurate in your assessment, you must have already inquired about it. You originally planned to return a thirty-thousand-year soul bone to him?"

Bibi Dong looked at Yan in surprise, and subconsciously glanced at Yan's right hand. Her intuition told her that this matter was not simple. The fact that Yan was being so polite could only mean that the hundred-year-old soul bone that had been absorbed had a secret.

"This is my decision, and I hope you can understand. There are some things I don't want to talk about right now."

Yan shook his head and did not reveal the secret that the right palm bone he absorbed was an external soul bone, which was his important trump card.

The prevailing understanding in the Soul Master community is that external Soul Bones are absorbed into the body along with the Soul Ring and cannot be extracted from the Soul Beast. Yan's right palm bone, however, was clearly decomposed. According to him, it was a mutated right arm bone, and everyone else agrees with this view.

"In that case, let's let that brat Xie Yue have it, for Nana's sake."

As Bibi Dong spoke, she pushed the right arm bone in front of Yan. "Xie Yue's left leg bone is a rightful qualification for you as the Holy Son, but this soul bone is a matter of concern from your teacher. As the Pope, I can make decisions about one or two soul bones."

It's a pity Nana is still young, and the two soul bones suitable for her are a bit too old, and both are skulls, making them difficult to absorb. It's better to wait until her cultivation level is higher.

“Alright, I’ll take it for now, maybe I’ll need it sometime. But there’s no need to rush Nana’s soul bone. I found a three-eyed demon fox that was over 50,000 years old in Sunset Forest. It has a high probability of producing a skull, which is very suitable for Nana’s seventh soul ring. It’s best if the soul ring and soul bone come from the same soul beast.”

Bibi Dong's generosity and enthusiasm made it impossible for Yan to refuse. How could he refuse a gift from a mature and elegant woman who looked at him with gentle eyes?

He placed the right arm bone of the 30,000-year-old Crimson Flame Beast into his spatial soul tool. The quality and power of this soul bone were indeed remarkable. Absorbing it would directly enhance his soul power and combat strength. However... he really didn't intend to absorb this soul bone.

Chapter 107 Soul Guidance Research

"Thank you very much, teacher, for this piece of soul bone."

Inside a side hall of the Papal Palace, Yan couldn't bear to refuse his gentle teacher's kindness. Who could refuse something good offered by a mature woman, even though he didn't intend to absorb the soul bone?

The effects of the 30,000-year-old Crimson Flame Beast Soul Bone are quite remarkable. It will have an immediate and noticeable effect on his aptitude, physique, and even his future potential. The 10,000-year-old Soul Bone can also greatly enhance his combat power.

However, there is a problem: this soul bone was not obtained after he hunted soul beasts and refined soul rings, so it cannot be combined with soul rings for a second enhancement.

Indeed, the reason Yan refined the two-thousand-year-old soul bone instead of this thirty-thousand-year-old one was because he valued the powerful effect of the combined amplification between the soul bone and the soul ring. Why emphasize this? Because through his research on soul bones, he discovered the possibility of upgrading the six main soul bones.

The six main soul bones are the six soul bones that soul masters can most easily fuse. Even an ordinary soul master with average foundation can fuse the six main soul bones that are ten thousand or even one hundred thousand years old.

However, if you switch to an external soul bone, it's a bit of a gamble. If it's an external soul bone with wings attached to a soul ring, you might be able to hunt a suitable soul beast.

Some materialized external soul bones, such as the Evil Eye Tyrant's eye soul bone and the Dark Gold Terror Claw Bear's external claw bone, depend on the soul master's own foundation. If the foundation is insufficient, the soul bone will backfire, causing serious injury or even death.

After obtaining the soul bone, Yan also began to study it. He himself only had one soul bone, but the Spirit Hall was so powerful that it had many more hidden in its treasury.

He had personally studied this right arm bone and the left leg bone he mentioned earlier for a period of time. Perhaps it was during that period of study that Bibi Dong mistakenly thought he was greedy for these soul bones, which is why she was so enthusiastic. But this misunderstanding is good; he hopes to get more.

He made some discoveries by comparing his own external soul bones with the soul bones in the treasure vault, as well as studying Liya's set of external soul bone wings.

As the largest soul master organization on the Douluo Continent, the Spirit Hall's ability to collect various key information is unparalleled by other forces. Most of the results that Yu Xiaogang researched were also derived from the data of the Spirit Hall.

As the Holy Son of the Spirit Hall, Yan was naturally qualified to access this data. By comparing the data among the users of the Spirit Bone inheritance throughout the ages, he discovered an interesting finding.

The result is that when a soul ring and soul bone from the same soul beast are refined by one person, the benefits are the greatest, and the quality of the soul bone will improve as that person's strength increases.

However, that kind of improvement only manifests in people who refine both soul rings and soul bones at the same time, and it is not as immediately effective as external soul bones. Therefore, no one realized this, and even if they did, they thought it was just an illusion because of their preconceived notions.

This discovery surprised Yan, who then thought of the prerequisites for general types of external soul bones. External soul bones that appear directly in a soul master's body along with the absorption of a soul ring also satisfy the requirement of absorbing both a soul ring and a soul bone. There seems to be some connection between the two.

It was precisely because of these discoveries that when the mutated Mirror Beast Soul Bone appeared, he couldn't wait to refine and experience its effects. The result was quite satisfactory, and he gained great benefits.

Simply absorbing the spirit ring of a Mirror Image Beast would only yield an 80% mirror image clone. While this would allow for multiple clones, the strength would also be dispersed. Conversely, simply absorbing the spirit bone of a Mirror Image Beast would only grant a highly resource-intensive teleportation ability.

However, when these two come together, they produce a different kind of change. It's as if he has completely refined the essence of the Mirror Beast's color, gaining extraordinary benefits, and strengthening the skills of his soul ring and soul bone.

The soul bone grants the soul ring a 20% skill boost, allowing his mirror clone to reach 100% of the original's combat power, and also giving it the ability to absorb blood and disguise itself as a copy, just like a mirror beast.

In addition to teleportation, his soul bone skills also allow him to teleport using his mirror image as an anchor point, which means he has gained four skills.

This passive amplification from refining the same soul beast's soul ring and soul bone can only be enjoyed by Yan. Even if others also obtain the Mirror Shadow Beast soul ring and Yan's soul bone, they cannot enjoy it.

All he could obtain were simple mirror images and teleportation, without any amplification. However, that wasn't all. After truly refining the soul bone, he also felt a resonance between his own soul ring and the soul bone, filling them with a certain spirituality, seemingly indicating potential for further improvement.

He didn't know if it was just his imagination, but he estimated that the benefits that the two-thousand-year-old Mirror Shadow Beast Soul Bone brought him were comparable to simply refining a ten-thousand-year-old Soul Bone. Even if he really couldn't evolve in the future, he would just have a one-hundred-thousand-year-old one in front of him. Of course, this was just a joke.

Anyway, there are methods for soul bone evolution in the original work, so there's no reason why he can't figure it out. The reason he hasn't achieved complete results yet is simply because he hasn't reached the right level yet. Once his strength increases, he will definitely achieve results, and with the blessing of soul bones, he will be able to grow even faster.

As for the soul bone given by Bibi Dong, since it wasn't obtained through refining a soul ring, the benefits of refining it might not be significant, and there's really no way to improve its quality. Furthermore, it occupies a soul bone slot, and getting rid of it later would practically require cutting off one's hand.

Although he doesn't plan to refine it for the time being, it can still be used as a trump card. Who knows, he might need to quickly increase his combat power when he encounters a life-or-death crisis.

After Yan collected the soul bone, he discussed some development plans for the Spirit Hall with Bibi Dong, then left the matter to his beloved Pope teacher and slipped away to do his research.

He set up a research lab in a room inside the Papal Palace, where he carried out some planning and research, such as research on soul bones and soul tools.

Over the years, the Spirit Hall has collected many complete soul tools and broken fragments from various ruins across the continent, and a large portion of them have been sent to him, especially the incomplete ones, which he has taken over.

Below the Elder Hall of Wuhun City lies the underground research lab established by Yan. Entering through the archway, one sees rows of neatly arranged counters, upon which are stacked numerous gleaming artifacts, most of which are damaged, with only a few intact.

If any outsiders came here, they would definitely be tempted to rob this place, because the items displayed on this counter are truly too precious. There are a considerable number of rare and precious medicinal herbs, as well as so many soul tools. It's simply a treasure trove.

Yan entered the research lab and went straight to the deepest part, which was a spacious room that occupied a considerable area.

The walls of the room were engraved with various metallic patterns, which extended to the very center, where there was a strange device. Two of the long, narrow parts of it glowed with a faint blue light. These were the two fragments of the soul tool that Yan had once obtained.

Chapter 108 The Power of Faith

"I originally thought it was just a space teleportation device, but I didn't expect it to involve time, space and faith."

Deep inside the Spirit Hall's underground research lab, Yan stared at the strange soul tool that resembled a door, a hint of oddity in his eyes. "Heaven knows what kind of monsters those soul tool masters of the ancient soul tool era were. Could they have been arcane masters?"

"You guys developed soul tools and expanded into Douluo Continent, fine, but you're even planning to extend your reach to other worlds, even venturing into the realm of faith. Isn't that just suicidal? Do you really think those guys in the God Realm... cough cough..."

As Yan finished speaking, he suddenly realized he had been a bit too bold. He glanced around nervously, then unconsciously looked up at the ceiling above his room. Above the research room was the Elder Hall, and the angel statue standing there was located directly above this room.

"May the angels bless you, Your faithful follower is only seeking to better develop the Spirit Hall, nothing more, just to borrow some money, borrow some money..."

Yan silently prayed to himself, regardless of whether the angel could hear him or not, he had to at least show some respect. After a moment of quiet prayer, he began to tinker with the thing in front of him.

He wasn't even sure what the original soul tool he'd replicated looked like. He gathered a bunch of materials, fused them together with two fragments following the original soul tool's patterns, and created this thing. According to the AI ​​Dawn, it involved the power of spacetime, but he hadn't yet tested its specific effects.

Originally, although he had managed to create this thing, he was not very confident and had simply left it idle. However, after receiving the 'gift' from the mutated Mirror Beast on this trip, he felt more confident and could no longer suppress the reckless spirit within him.

"The activation of this thing not only involves soul power, but also the power of faith. It competes with the gods of the divine realm for faith. No wonder the original group of soul guides were wiped out."

As Yan muttered to himself, he walked to a corner of the room and placed his hand on a disc. A faint light of soul power emanated from his body, and a faint holy radiance slowly entered the disc. The blue-glowing door gradually began to show some energy fluctuations.

"The identity of the Holy Son of the Spirit Hall is really good. The power of faith on him is several times that of ordinary people. Even a Title Douluo doesn't have this much faith. No wonder so many people like power and high position."

Yan sensed the magical energy within him entering the disc and used the Dawn of Intelligence to continuously collect data and build a more comprehensive database.

The power that the disc drew from him was not only soul power, but also a power that only gods could utilize—the power of faith.

The power of faith, more accurately described as a magical spiritual force, arises when a person talks about, cares about, or even believes in a particular person or thing, generating a power of faith that converges on that target.

Having faith in others, or providing that special spiritual power to others, is generally harmless as long as it doesn't lead to a state of frenzied exploitation. Yan came to this conclusion after trying to invoking and worshipping the Angel God.

There are also some evil gods in the universe who do not take the slow and steady approach, but instead frantically exploit the faith of their believers. Those who are exploited to the point of madness to provide faith power will indeed lose their lives.

Yan learned a great deal about the power of faith after his research. He realized that not only gods have faith, but humans do too. In feudal times, those most worshipped were naturally the monarchs, nobles, and those with the highest power. Their every action influenced the fate of countless people, and thus they were naturally of great concern to many.

However, generally speaking, no matter how much faith a mortal has, he is still just a mortal and cannot make use of it. To utilize the power of faith, you must first reach the level of a god.

The Sea God and the Angel God, the two native gods of Douluo Continent, are examples of this. After reaching the Limit Douluo realm and comprehending their own laws, they began to travel the world, spreading their fame and becoming legends in the hearts of countless people and beings, collecting faith, and finally becoming gods in one fell swoop.

The power of faith can not only create gods, but is also closely related to the existence of the God Realm. The God Realm in the Douluo Universe is a world that is half spiritual and half material, and the key power that maintains its existence and development is the power of faith. The God Realm attaches great importance to faith.

The divine realm refers to the power of faith as psychic power. The divine realm was created and continuously expanded using a massive amount of psychic power. It can be said that psychic power is the root of the divine realm. Anyone who messes around in this area will be crushed. That's why Yan said that the group of first-generation soul guides were playing with fire. Without a background, playing with this kind of thing is just courting death.

Look how clever he is. He built the object under the angel statue, and Hai even revealed a little bit of information to Qian Daoliu and Qian Renxue, which can be considered as reporting it. Anyway, everything has been going quite smoothly since he started this research.

Moreover, even the power he used to activate this magic array originated from his own faith. After all, his title as the Holy Son of the Spirit Hall was too great, so many people talked about him, and he possessed a great deal of spiritual power.

This stuff can't be used directly before reaching the divine realm, so it's a waste to just let it accumulate. It would be better to use it for experiments.

"I don't know if this experiment will succeed. I feel like I'm courting death by invoking the power of spacetime. But it's okay, I have teleportation ability. My clone is outside the Papal Palace, so running away is just a matter of a moment. Even if it attracts a big shot, this is the Spirit Hall, the territory of the Angel God. What big shot can compare to a first-level main god?"

Yan secretly plotted everything in his mind. He had considered building the research lab below the Elder Hall. Who knew what kind of trouble would be attracted by playing with the Way of Time and Space? Naturally, he needed the help of a big shot to suppress the trouble.

However, in the Douluo Universe, the God Realm is the only dominant power. It seems that only the Abyss Saint King and the Crimson Mother of the Abyss Plane are first-level gods. However, the former has no physical form and was actually killed by Tang Hao with a single hammer in the original work, which is extremely embarrassing.

Although the Crimson Mother is a veteran powerhouse among the first-level gods, it will still be tens of thousands of years before she forcibly breaks through to the God King level. At present, she is probably no match for the Angel God, a veteran first-level god who has reached the upper limit of godhood. Moreover, the Abyss Plane at this stage is hiding from the Douluo God Realm, so the probability of problems is not high.

Yan made this judgment in his mind. He was also confident that with the amount of activating power he had injected, he would be lucky to find other planes around Douluo Continent. He was probably not qualified to attract the Abyss Plane.

Just as Yan was struggling with his thoughts, a faint light of holy spiritual power filled the entire 'Gate of Time and Space'. Blue and silver light burst forth, and a strange light curtain appeared in the gate, revealing a blurry region in Yan's sight.

The Inner Earth

Chapter 109 The Inner Earth

"The picture quality is so blurry. Forget about standard definition or high definition, it's not even smooth."

Inside the Spirit Hall's underground research lab, Yan looked at the smoothly operating spacetime portal in front of him and boldly approached the light screen. He felt somewhat annoyed by the extremely blurry image inside; it was impossible to see anything clearly with such an image.

However, as he got closer, he could vaguely sense that the speed of the other side was not low. Waves of heat surged out from the light screen, as if he had arrived in the hot summer. This made him wonder if he had connected to a world in the center of the earth.

Meanwhile, in the center of some subterranean world, a vast lava lake was constantly churning and bubbling, and everything around it was a vibrant, scorching red.

"Boom..."

In a lake of magma that was constantly bubbling and whose temperature was unknown, a huge column of magma erupted like a water column, and at the top of the magma fire column, a fair, slender, and delicate jade hand appeared.

The hand was as tender as a scallion, with skin as white as snow, forming a stark contrast with the surrounding exploding lava and flames.

"Who is watching me? It seems to be the aura of a god?"

A pleasant voice emanated from the pillar of magma, and a hazy, enchanting figure seemed to appear in this subterranean world. A pale white hand suddenly reached out and pierced through a hazy blue-silver light.